SEC Chair White leaving at end of Obama administration

WASHINGTON (AP) — The head of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Mary Jo White, will leave office at the end of the Obama administration, the agency said Monday.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, the liberal Democratic leader who is a fiery critic of Wall Street, last month called on Obama to replace White over the issue of requiring publicly traded corporations to more fully disclose their political spending.

The SEC also required financial firms that sell securities backed by mortgages or auto loans, like the kind that fueled the crisis, to give investors details on borrowers' credit records and income.

White, who was U.S. attorney in Manhattan from 1993 through 2002, compiled an extensive record of prosecuting white-collar crime, won convictions in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and the 1998 terrorist attacks on two U.S. embassies in Africa, and put crime boss John Gotti away.

After leaving government, White worked for a decade as a corporate attorney at a New York-based firm, her blue-chip client roster including JPMorgan Chase, Microsoft, General Electric and Toyota.